


a composite love

by smithens



Category: Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Canon Era, François Marie Charles Fourier - Freeform, Friendship/Love, M/M, Reading, logic and philosophy week
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-29
Updated: 2016-10-29
Packaged: 2018-08-27 16:03:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8407927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smithens/pseuds/smithens
Summary: For Combeferre, to share Enjolras's company while enjoying the weather is enough to be grateful for. Tranquility, he knows, does not come easily anymore.
Combeferrre and Enjolras, having found the time to do so, spend an afternoon with one another in a garden.





	

**Author's Note:**

> title is from Charles Fourier, the reasons for which will be seen. this fic also doubles as a game of "spot the half-enigmatical but significant metaphor". (thanks Hapgood/Hugo!) 
> 
> this is possibly the last piece I will publish for Logic and philosophy week 2016, hosted by the wonderful oilan! <3 please enjoy :)

In the year of 1831, the transition from spring to summer comes to a peak early, in the month of May: chilled, dewy mornings turn warm and bright, sprouted buds bloom into mature flowers. The gardens are colorful, and they crowd with those who have leisure time enough to enjoy them.

Fresh air is abundant - or, so abundant as it can be in Paris, and the blue skies only assist in the perception.

Busy as he is, Combeferre would never wish to pass up the opportunity to bask in the air and sun: between the rounds and procedures at the Necker that now occupy most of his waking hours, days spent outside remain a luxury reserved for either unoccupied Saturdays or an early midday dismissal from his internat work (although he must always return in the evening, on those days). Even so, such a venture is rare for him; ordinarily, he devotes his weekends to working with the society or to more active worldly pursuits, and early dismissals generally end up as time to continue his tasks unbothered (or time to rush home for a nap, if absolutely necessary).

Yet lately, he has been rearranging whatever he can to enjoy the outdoors, to keep from going from his little apartment at the Necker, directly to the wards, and then back again with little time for anything else before he must sleep to repeat the process the next morning.  

And while it is rare that he can find time to himself, it is rarer still that he might be accompanied on a day outside. In the past weeks, Prouvaire has joined him at times without forewarning, on account of “being in the neighborhood”, or, less commonly, former coursemates have invited him along with them before they need to return their own placements.

Most often, however, he has been alone.

Of course, he doesn’t mind it, as the occasion to relax in that way doesn’t come along often - it is nice, however, to share his diminishing free time.

But if those events are merely rare, it might be - if Combeferre allows himself to consider the probability of the thing in such a way - plainly miraculous were Enjolras able to accompany him in his unoccupied leisure.

Unfortunately, now that he has become more involved in the day to day action of the surgical profession, their schedules too have become incompatible: Combeferre’s timetable is complicated and ever-evolving, Enjolras’s routine does not lend well to unnecessary deviation. To have the chance to spend any daytime alone with Enjolras is to have a chance worth taking, but particularly on a working day - that is worthy of celebration.

This thought he keeps private. Certainly he had not allowed himself too much hope when they had arranged the meeting; even as he waited for Enjolras earlier, he prepared himself for disappointment, that something might come up.

But nothing did.

And now Enjolras is with him, on a mutually available Wednesday afternoon, and he met Combeferre's suggestion that they cross to the Tuileries with affirmation rather than reluctance.

…if not a miracle, at the very least it makes for an exceedingly fortunate coincidence between them.

Together they managed to find a bit of shade beneath a tree at the edge of the garden, were able to rest their backs against its trunk, and for a bit of time had sat leaning against one another but each separate and wordless in his own activity, in shared peace.

For Combeferre, to share Enjolras's company while enjoying the weather is enough to be grateful for. Tranquility, he knows, does not come easily anymore.

And, though Enjolras is unconcerned with both the change of the seasons and Combeferre’s re-readings that come along with it, he seems never to begrudge Combeferre for discussing at length his thoughts, either. Thus, their wordlessness ceases when Enjolras enquires about his reading, but the peace of their togetherness continues still:

"...you are largely unacquainted with his writing, then, I take it,” Combeferre says, adjusting his position so that he is able to meet Enjolras’s eyes while maintaining their tactile connection. Carefully, he sets his hand at Enjolras’s hip, where passers-by will not see but where Enjolras will feel him near anyhow.

Enjolras nods - at the statement and the touch both, if his half smile is any indication.

"Marginally, perhaps."

"Might I explain? - ah, perhaps, tell me with what you are familiar."

"Only what you have told me," says Enjolras, in a tone Combeferre knows well. His voice is musical as always, but carefully slow and nonchalant, impartial. “And only what I have read from your own shelves.”

After years together, it is no labor to introduce Enjolras to his interests: he can be curt, but he is attentive, and his offered opinions serve to keep Combeferre's own under control, to focus his enthusiasm. At those times when Enjolras allows himself a distraction, Combeferre is always eager to provide one - and to allow himself to be distracted, also.

(Years ago, given the tumult of their early friendship, Combeferre had been apprehensive to share more with Enjolras than the carefully mapped ground of historical opinions. As they had grown more intimate, he had come to worry more about the irrelevance of his breadth of enthusiasm, but Enjolras, for all his austerity and his quiet charm, has a voice of reason even at those times when he does not have thorough knowledge. In the way that rationality complements fantasy, so does Enjolras complement him.)  
  
The previous summer had further solidified their friendship, and with that development their ideals had strengthened enough that cautiously selected distractions became a benefit rather than a detractor to their work. Rest, Combeferre knows, is crucial to optimal function for body and mind both, and he and Enjolras learned this together, in partnership with each other and with their friends, during those months when all had lacked it.

If the distraction which Enjolras has chosen for them now is Combeferre’s cultivated fixation with the writings of Fourier, he is happy to provide it - still, it is beneficial to know where to begin.  

“I have not told you much, have I?” asks Combeferre, and Enjolras looks away - but not before Combeferre sees his smile widen.

“In fact you have not told me anything about your reading at present, Combeferre, but I say I have known you long enough to know what interests you,” he replies lightly. Combeferre has mind to explain himself - he is happy to elaborate on the matter before expounding upon his own opinions - but Enjolras effectively stops him from doing so when he shrugs off his coat, takes Combeferre’s book from his hands, and moves to rest against his chest, nearly seating himself in his lap in the process.

“I shall read to you aloud, from wherever, and if I have cause to question you, I should like to do so. How is that?”

“You are especially gay this afternoon, aren’t you?”

Enjolras flips through the pages of the book a little before returning to the chapter Combeferre had been rereading prior.  

“No,” he says finally, “but I am beginning to think about your guidance, Combeferre, that is - that at times there is indeed an occasion for pleasure. I should like to share it with you. Now - may I?”

He holds up the book, touching his middle and pointer finger to precisely the line at which Combeferre had stopped reading. Whether it is coincidence or connection, Combeferre cannot decide - neither, however, does he mind.

“Please do.”

Enjolras wastes no time in beginning:

“The learned world,” he says, his voice lilting and songlike even as he reads from a text, “is wholly imbued with a doctrine termed morality, which is a mortal enemy of passional attraction. Morality teaches man to be at war with himself...”

_So it does_ , Combeferre thinks, and, resting his hand at Enjolras’s thigh, devotes his focus that he may listen.  

 

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading! <3 I greatly appreciate all kudos and comments.
> 
> (a link to this fic was also posted on my Tumblr, @smithensy.)


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